Yeah this does not happen. Of course you go to the front of the line if you have anything near life-threatening.

The problem (which I think is what OP were talking about) is anything that’s not critical but still need to be looked at by a specialist. In that case long waiting times are not uncommon. Yes it’s a big problem but it’s not a problem that will kill you.

I don't think the wait for cancer patients is 4 months. Even in Portugal you'll get treated and we're much poorer with a much more deficient health system.

This leads me to wonder...

Do cancer survival rates differ in countries with government health care vs. private?

Looks like the US has some of the highest rates across the board: http://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/cancer-survival-r...

I am not sure if 5-year survival rates are the best metric for this. Survival rate may be because of better outcomes or earlier detection. Is there any statistics that normalize for this?

Yes.[0] But I'm unsure whether this is due to private vs public healthcare. My guess is that it has more to do with how developed the medical industry is in the country. Size of the country probably matters as well.

[0] https://www.cdc.gov/cancer/dcpc/research/articles/concord-2....

5 year survival rates may be heavily influenced by detection rates. If country A detects my lung cancer at 55 and country B at 59 and either way I die at 60 - I’m no better off in A. Maybe worse.

Life threatening stuff is obviously not going to be a 4 month wait. The OP obviously didn’t have this sort of issue.

If people were dying left and right from waiting for cancer treatment. There would be a ton of news about that. No less in American media showing how bad European health care is.

Statistics on mortality don't show that happening.

Does that actually happen?